Details

CPU Clock Rate

3.8GHz

GPU Core Clock Rate

800MHz

GPU Effective Memory Clock Rate

1.3GHz

Description

I built this computer because my laptop was crapping out and thought it would be fun to give it a try to build one. It took me 5 months to gather all the parts while looking for the best deals I could. With everything together it cost me (out of my own pocket) $308 which includes a fan splitter cable that is not listed below. The Hard drive was given to me as a Christmas gift from my parents, so if I had to buy it the build would have been around $420. The Hard drive I was looking at was $60; so if I were to buy the HD, I would have still been under my $350 budget.

I plan on getting another 8 GB of RAM, possibly a video card (which one would work great with the 5800k?) and possibly a 3.5 peripheral (whatever that may be). I had to buy a cheap crappy keyboard that cost me $13, I already had the monitor, mouse and speakers. I will eventually get a wireless keyboard. I put Linux Ubuntu 13.10 and will probably never go back to windows.

I can now say that I have the bug and already want to build another computer in hopes to selling it. I also want to try and overclock this computer to around 4.0-4.2 ghz. I just have no idea how to do it.

Anyways, I am very happy with this build and want to build another computer soon.

(Edit). I added a Corsair 430W ATX12V in replacement of the coolmax V400 and it is really nice. It's quiet and I love that it is more ventilated. Still under my $350 budget.

While I would normally agree with you, this PSU has over 100% clearance. Sure it's a POS PSU but there's nothing stressing it at all and if it didn't fail within the first day it's probably not going to for a while. OP can always whip out a multimeter just to make sure though.

I agree. While it is a crappy quality PSU, no way this rig could even hit 200W total power draw. You're safe... for now...
Edit: If you plan to overclock, swap that PSU first.
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/corsair-power-supply-cx430 Not exactly the fanciest, or most efficient PSU, but at least it's a reputable brand and Bronze efficiency. Oh, and only 20 bucks after mail-in-rebate at Micro Center.

It's not the wattage that most people are referring to when they say "get a better psu." Its the build quality. A PSU with a "lower" quality has a much lower mean time between failure, ie it has a higher failure rate, and with lower quality comes the chance that it could take out a piece of hardware with it.

As far as names go, most Corsair, EVGA, SeaSonic, XFX. Sometimes it is tough to tell because the "name" on the unit is almost never the company that actually makes the unit. For example, some but not all XFX are actually rebranded SeaSonic units, but at a lower price. And so it goes with the other brands aswell, one is usually a rebrand of another.

Whats generally important about the name is how they handle RMA's and customer issues. All hardware will fail eventually.

Truthfully, it wouldn't be the smartest move to go from an APU to an APU (CPU+GPU) with another GPU. For the price of the A10, it would be possible to get an FX-4300 or so, or an i3. But this also requires a new motherboard, which should cost at least 60 dollars more.

Since AMD APUs are designed to be used as a standalone CPU+GPU, the only budget-friendly thing you can do is crossfire a Radeon 6670 (or whatever is crossfire compatible with that APU).

Also the APU likes them fast ram, since its used for both components. (and please, spend at least 40 dollars on a power supply if you trust it to last over a year)

So in short, if you want to upgrade, you almost have to buy a more powerful CPU along with a dedicated GPU. If you wanted to get just a graphics card, it would be fine, except that the CPU would bottleneck the system.

The GPU should be fine for most low-setting games, so I would put money into other parts (such as the PSU, aftermarket CPU cooler for better overclocking, and even look into some very fast ram, as it will increase the performance a lot.)

My motherboard only supports up to 1600. I didn't know this until it arrived in the mail, otherwise I was going to use 2133.I was dissapointed. I'm on tomshardware all the time, never thought the psu was that big of a deal. Thanks for the heads up.

If/when you choose to, 42 @1600MHz will be faster than 18 @1600MHz because of dual channel, if you motherboard/APU supports it. That is unless you choose to eventually go 2*8 (which is far more than most people need, unless you do a ton of multi-threaded activites, photo and video work and stuff.)

there are two things you could've done better: different power supply, and better RAM. unlike most platforms, APUs better leverage faster RAM due to the integrated GPU inside of them, and DDR3-2133 is about as ideal for an APU as you can get. the good news is, getting a set of DDR3-2133 RAM is hardly more than a few dollars more expensive than DDR3-1600, so you could've gotten much better performance using graphics-intensive programs for not much more than what you already paid.

as for your power supply, you really should've taken a look at what brands were known to be reliable and what brands will eventually make you spend more money than if you bought a higher-quality unit in the first place. Coolmax is one of those very unreliable brands; thus, you should take our advice and buy a better brand before your $25 unit causes more than that in damages. for future reference, Tom's Hardware has a great guide detailing who makes what for each brand, and Newegg has an unofficial forum thread regarding quality power supplies. i suggest you start your research there.